"'Be not greatly aggrieved with sin that falleth to thee against thy will'. And here I understood that....the Lord beholdeth the servant with pity and not with blame. For this passing life asketh not to live all without...sin."
Julian of Norwich (Ch. 82)
We don't need to be upset or demoralized when we fail and do the things we don't want to do. And that is one important thing: we don't want to sin. We can certainly be tempted and fall into sin, and we can certainly choose hurtful ways perhaps due to being hurt ourselves or not understanding how much God loves us, but deep down we don't want to sin. We want to do right and be a good person in our lifestyle. Sin comes to us, then, against our will, that inner good and godly will that our Creator put in us when He made us, that image of God in us, that wonderful Christ in us as the ground of our whole being. So we can see that we can fall and stumble in this life, but we don't let it get us down, we don't let any condemnation or shame stick to us. God doesn't condemn us, so we won't condemn ourselves either! God doesn't look on us with blame or criticism, so we won't blame and criticize ourselves either. God treats us with love and compassion, so we will treat ourselves with love and compassion. And we can pass that compassion on to those around us, who are also perfectly loved by God in the midst of their sometimes failing behavior. This is the successful and full Christian life - not to always behave perfectly, but to be able to receive God's love in the midst of our sometimes failing behavior, and to be able to extend that same love to ourselves and to others.
What a relief to find that we are not required to behave perfectly in our lives! We are not expected to meet some impossible standard of perfection and have all our thoughts, words and deeds be absolutely without mistake. No human could live up to that standard. Only Christ Jesus the One who is both human and divine was able to live up to the perfect standard! He was perfectly obedient to God in all He did and fulfilled the perfect standard, then He set it aside as obsolete and showed us a new way to live, the way God always intended: a love-based way rather than a rule-based way. We can enjoy a wonderful love-based relationship with God even in the midst of our mistakes and flaws. The pressure is off. We are completely accepted and loved just as we are. We are loved whether we behave well or badly, loved whether we improve in our various areas of weakness and loved even if those areas never see improvement. We are taken off the performance scale for good. We are simply enjoying God's love for free, with no strings attached and no requirements or stipulations added. In the midst of such acceptance and unconditional love, we find ourselves relaxing. We find ourselves feeling happy and light and free. We find ourselves feeling strong and confident. We find ourselves being more understanding and kind to ourselves and others. Without even trying, we find that love fills us and flows from us. We are actually being our true self, who we have always been deep down - a human living in union with God! How does it happen? Not by trying to keep the rules or change in our own strength. We know the end of that story, and it isn't pretty. This new way is all love. We are able to be the true, kind, good and loving people we always were simply by being loved with no conditions!
Isn't the love way of God so wonderful! We will be transformed by love. It's inevitable. There will always be times where we slip up and fail, and that's ok. Something is different now. Now we don't have to take on shame and condemnation for those things. Now we can leave them with God. Our behavior is His responsibility and He will take care of it, whether in the short term or the long term. But the main issue is not change at all. It is simply love. If we never were transformed, we would still be loved. We would still be fine with God. We would still be God's beloved and valued children. It really is all about love!
"For you who welcome him, in whom he dwells - even though you still experience all the limitations of sin - you yourself experience life on God's terms."
Romans 8:10 (MSG)
"In your generous love I am really living at last!"
Psalm 63:3 (MSG)
A Prayer: Your love is the best thing in the world!